USA > Massachusetts > The story of western Massachusetts, Volume I > Part 11
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CHAPTER X
Early New England Houses
I N RECENT years there has been some difference of opinion as to the type of house built by the first settlers in southern New Eng- land. Log houses were unquestionably used in frontier towns at a later period, and this has led to a confusion which assigns them to the earliest times. The available evidence would indicate :
That the settlers established here prior to 1638 were with- out traditions or knowledge of log houses.
That contemporary books, journals, letters and records, though profuse with details of other abodes, make no mention of log houses.
That timber sufficient for their construction was not available.
A log house, as here mentioned, refers to the type familiar at a later period in the Middle West, made from whole logs with the bark on, the overlapping ends of which were cut-out and let-in at the cor- ners, the interstices between the logs being filled with clay and moss.
An English Pilgrim settling at Plymouth in 1620, or an English Puritan coming to Boston in 1630, would have had as much knowledge of how to build such a log house, as he would have had of an Eskimo igloo,-and no more. He could not have had the slightest conception of what it was all about.
It is possible that, among the roving mariners on the ships, there might have been ones who had seen such a structure in Russia or Scandinavia, but the emigrants themselves, small-town lawyers, mer- chants, mechanics, farmers, simply would never have even heard of them.
Apparently, the first log houses in America were built by the Swedes and Finns who settled at Delaware in 1638, where they intro- duced the house of logs with notched ends, with which they were familiar in their homeland. In time, the idea was carried westward and back east, but it was many years before such was known in New England. The earliest log house, of record in Springfield, was built by David Morgan for John Pynchon in 1678, presumably for the use of a sheep herder.
The English of Boston and Plymouth were constantly passing back and forth between New England and Virginia, with stops at New
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Amsterdam and New Sweden so that eventually a knowledge of log house construction was inevitable. Van der Donck, in 1655, said that "most of the English of New England who wish to go south to Vir- ginia, to South River, or to other southern places, pass through the East River, which brings no small traffic and advantage to the city of New Amsterdam. This also causes the English to frequent our har- bors, to which they are invited for safety."
It is true, that at an early period, a building of the so-called block house construction (the block bau of the Germans) was occasionally built here, but such were not of the type referred to. The latter were of logs, squared on at least two sides so as to fit closely together, a structure of solid timbers, piled one on another. Where ample timber was available, they were as speedily and economically constructed as a framed house and had the advantage of being bullet proof. But they were community fortresses; not houses. Examples of this type still exist, with a later covering of clapboards over the hewn timbers.
It is equally true that for defensive purposes, the English used upright logs, set into the ground, in imitation of the Indian stockades. During their first year at Plymouth, the Pilgrims "agreed to inclose their dwellings with a good strong pale and make flankers in con- venient places, with gates to shut, which were every night locked and a watch kept. This was accomplished and the town impaled around by the beginning of March, in which every family had a pretty garden." In February, 1677-78, the town of Springfield arranged for "the fortification of the new meeting house with logs ten foot and one half in length and between ten and twelve inches in breadth".
In 1637 Philip Vincent described a Pequot fort as follows: "They pitch, close together as they can, young trees and half trees, as thick as a mans thigh or the calf of his leg. Ten or twelve foot high they are above the ground and within, rammed three foot deep with under- mining, the earth being cast up for their better shelter against the enemy's dischargements. Betwixt these palisadoes are divers loop- holes, through which they let fly their winged messengers. The door, for the most part, is entered sideways, which they stop with boughs or bushes, as need requireth. The space therein is full of wigwams".
William Byrd saw a similar fortification in Virginia in 1728. "This fort was a square piece of ground, enclosed with substantial puncheons, or strong palisades, about ten feet high, and leaning a little outwards, to make a scalade more difficult. Each side of the square might be about a hundred yards long, with loop-holes at proper distances, through which they fire upon the enemy. Within this en- closure we found bark cabins sufficient to lodge all their people".
Of all the timber buildings in England known to the people who emigrated to America in the seventeenth century, there exists but one made of logs. At Greenstead, Essex, there still stands a Saxon church built entirely of logs. Its walls are formed of half trunks of trees, but set upright, with the split side facing inwards, each half trunk being tenoned into a plate above and a sill below. Buildings of
W. Mass .- I-7
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horizontal logs simply did not exist in England and were unknown to the people who came here.
Contemporary journals and letters provide ample evidence as to the type of shelters first used by the New England pioneers. Un- fortunately. Bradford gives little definite information as to the houses first built at Plymouth, but he at least makes no mention of log
Bartholomew's Cobbles, Sheffield
houses. He frequently mentions houses but gives little clue as to their type.
Mourt relates that on Saturday. December 23, 1620. as many as could, went ashore: "felled and carried timber to provide themselves stuff for building", and the following Monday "went on shore. some to fell timber, some to saw, some to rive. some to carry; so no man rested all that day".
Bradford tells us that on that Christmas Day they "began to erect the first house for common use to receive them and their goods and after they had provided a place for their goods or common store. they began some small cottages for their habitation". However, as on January 14. 1621. "the house which they had made for a general
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rendezvous, by casualty fell afire", it can readily be assumed that it was of rather light construction, with a thatched roof, as recorded data concerning Massachusetts Bay houses of the following decade show that it was buildings of that type that were constantly menaced by fire.
On the Mayflower came John Alden, the cooper, and a cooper was a woodworker of more than average ability. Also on the May- flower was Francis Eaton, a carpenter. Moreover, the ship remained at Plymouth until April, 1621, and of necessity there must have been ship carpenters in her crew. A ship carpenter was more than com- petent to build a house after the English manner. The following year, William Bassett an iron worker, and William Palmer a nail maker, came on the Fortune. Also, in 1621, came on the Ann, Edward Bangs a shipwright, and on the Little James, John Jenney, another cooper. It is hard to imagine these craftsmen building houses not in accord- ance with the traditions of the trade, and buildings of horizontal logs were most definitely not traditional with them.
In September, 1623, a number of houses at Plymouth were destroyed by a fire which damaged "the end of the storehouse which was wattled up with boughs, in the withered leaves of which the fire was kindled, a firebrand an ell long lying under the wales on the inside". By no fair reasoning can such details be construed as refer- ring to anything but a building of framed construction, with a wattle- and-daub outer covering, such as the settlers had known in the old country. That same year, the ship Ann returned to England "laden with clapboards". Clapboards were then used for making barrels, but from pure necessity were later adopted for house siding. This ingenious adaptation was so successful that such use has been common practice to the present time. Surely, people with the ability to prepare a shipload of clapboards were capable of building framed houses. Furthermore, log house building is most wasteful of lumber, which was none too plentiful in the vicinity of Plymouth. The settlers needed every available bit for export to pay their pressing debts and obligations.
Apparently there was a ready market for clapboards. In telling of the settlement of Jamestown, Virginia, in 1607, Smith said that "until the thirteenth of May they sought a place to plant in; now falleth every man to work, the council to contrive the fort, the rest cut down trees to make place to pitch their tents; some provide clap- boards to relade the ships, some make gardens, some nets".
About 1626 the Plymouth people built a trading house at Mana- met, some twenty miles south of Plymouth, which, after long research, was reproduced by the Bourne Historical Society in 1930. Careful investigation showed that the original building stood on a cellar of field stones, at least a part having been laid up in mortar. The immense chimney was of brick and the house seems to have been clap- board and shingled. It unquestionably was equipped with leaded glass windows, having diamond panes.
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In 1633 still another trading house was established by Plymouth; at what is now Windsor, on the Connecticut. There they erected the first English-built house in Connecticut and the records show that it was not a log house. Bradford reports that "having made a small frame of a house ready, and having a great new barque, they stowed their frame in her hold and boards to cover and finish it, having nails and all other provisions fitting for their use. Coming to their place, they clapped up their house quickly and afterwards palisaded their house about and fortified themselves".
Plymouth, however, must bear the onus of most persistently per- petuating the log house myth. Some years ago, a person of the type that Dr. Edward Everett Hale dubbed as "a late and insufficient authority", perpetrated a painting purporting to depict Plymouth Street with long rows of log cabins. This has been reproduced in countless ways, especially on picture post cards, an appalling quantity of which, trippers have for years mailed all over the world. Emanat- ing from the cradle of history, they have been accepted as something simon-pure and authentic and have long been used in schools by care- less educators.
Francis Higginson came to Salem in 1629, where he "found about half a score houses, and a fair house newly built for the governor".
The people who came to Boston in 1630 knew it to be in the same latitude as Rome, and expecting to find here a similar climate, many brought tents for temporary shelter. When their illusions were dis- pelled by experience, they made huts of boughs and bark, in the Indian fashion, or dug caves in banks, which they shored up with timber and roofed over with riven boards.
But they made no mention of log houses.
Edward Johnson said: "They burrow themselves in the earth for their first shelter, under some hillside, casting the earth aloft up on the timber and thus provide shelter for themselves, their wives and little ones". This was the type of shelter first constructed by the Dorchester people at Windsor, Connecticut. A cave, dug into the river bank composed three walls; the front was of boards with a door and window; the roof of thatch or sod. The last of these long-aban- doned dugouts was filled in as recently as 1926.
Bartholomew Green related that when his father arrived at Boston in 1630, "for lack of housing he was wont to find shelter at night in an empty cask". Of the first of the Massachusetts Bay people Johnson said: "They pitched some tents of cloth, others built them huts in which they lodged their wives and children". Winthrop records that "the poorer sort of people, who lay long in tents were much afflicted with scurvy".
It should be observed that the word tent, as early used, was far more comprehensive than at present and referred to any frame covered with cloth, skins or other material which afforded warmth. Johnson is quite specific in his mention of "tents of cloth". On the other hand, Winthrop, in his use of the word, apparently referred to any hut or shack of a temporary nature.
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From Boston, March 28, 1630-31, Thomas Dudley wrote to the Countess of Lincoln of an "accident of fire which also befel Mr. Sharp and Mr. Colburn, upon the seventeenth of March; both of whose houses (which were as good and as well furnished as most in the plantation) were in two hours space burned to the ground; together with much of their household stuff, apparel and other things; as also some goods of others, who sojourned with them in their houses. For the prevention whereof, in our new town intended this summer to be builded; we have ordered that no man shall build his chimney with wood, nor cover his house with thatch, which was readily assented unto; for that divers other houses had been burned since our arrival".
Most certainly these were "first houses", for these people had arrived only the previous summer. Dudley was describing the unusual things of the new world. Had he met with anything so foreign to an English woman as a log house, he surely would have mentioned it.
There is amply evidence to show that though log cabins were built by pioneers of a later period, on another frontier, along the Atlantic coast, in the early seventeenth century, the same type of people built wigwams. It was but the natural and common-sense thing to do,-a following of the line of least resistance and taking advantage of what the country had to offer. William Byrd relates how similar emergencies were met by experienced pioneers at a later period and in another locality, but under similar primitive conditions. In Virginia, in 1728, he said : "The cedars were of singular use to us in the absence of our tent which we had left with the rest of the bag- gage for fear of overloading the periaugs. We made a circular hedge of the branches of this tree, wrought so close together as to fence us against the cold winds. We then kindled a rousing fire in the center of it, and lay around it like so many knights templars".
At Saco, in 1623, Christopher Levett built a wigwam in an hour,- "it had no frame, only a few poles set up together and covered with our boates sailes". Roger Clap, who came to Charlestown in 1630, said that "before they could build at Boston, they lived, many of them, in tents and wigwams". In August, 1631, "the Tarentines rifled a wigwam where Mr. Cradock's men kept to catch sturgeon". John Goyt came to Marblehead in 1637 and "first built a wigwam and lived there till he got a house". In Maryland, in 1634, one of the adventurers, after describing the Indians' wigwams, added that "many of us live in these witchotts (as they term them) conveniently enough till better be set up. But they are dressed up something better than when the Indians had them.".
These "English wigwams", as they were called, differed from those of the natives in two important respects. To conserve heat, the Indian wigwam had a door so low that the occupant went in and out on hands and knees. During the Connecticut tercentenary cele- bration a replica of an Algonkian wigwam was built at Glastonbury. It was a commendable effort, but, lacking better material, the covering was of pig skins, quite uniform in size, so that the illustration was
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not all that could be desired. A hole, a foot in diameter in the earth floor, held the fire. With the low doorway, even on a blustery fall day, the heat inside was almost unbearable.
The white man's wigwam had a man-height door frame with a hinged door, as well as a chimney and fireplace. This chimney, a cribwork of round sticks, plastered with clay, was a constant fire hazard. In October, 1630, Winthrop noted that "Finch, of Water- town, had his wigwam burnt with all his goods". On November 10th of that same year "Giles Firmin of Watertown had his wigwam burnt".
People of means, of course, had no need to rely on such crude structures, for the Winthrop fleet brought competent mechanics, equipped with adequate tools. In October, 1631, "the governor, hav- ing erected a building of stone at Mistick, there came a violent rain, two sides of it were washed down to the ground, it being not finished and laid with clay for want of lime; much harm was done to other houses by that storm". In May, 1632, Thomas Dudley was taken to task by the governor "for bestowing so much cost on wainscotting his house and otherwise adorning it", but remonstrated that he had merely clapboarded the inner walls for warmth. In August, 1632, John Oldham "had a small house at Watertown, made all of clap- boards, burnt down".
On a timber framework, they tacked willow shoots and plastered the sides with clay, the "wattle-and-daub" of their ancestors. When they found this construction, though durable in the climate of Eng- land, succumbed to New England weather conditions, they added an outer covering of clapboards. Such construction can be seen today in the Fairbanks house at Dedham, with the "wattle-and-daub" under the clapboards.
When the settlement of Saybrook was planned, in 1635, to super- vise the establishment of the colony, the sponsors imported from Holland, Lionel Gardiner, an experienced engineer. Gardiner arrived at Boston in November, 1635, on the ship Batchelor, which brought for the enterprise, iron work for two drawbridges and material for portcullises. This would indicate visions of moated castles, rather than log cabins.
Instructions were given to provide at least fifty men "for making of fortifications and building of houses". September 15, 1635, Sir Arthur Hasselrigge wrote asking that "with what speed possible, fit houses be builded". September 22, Sir Henry Lawrence demanded "convenient buildings for the receipt of gentlemen". February 23, 1636, Sir Matthew Boynton asked "what course I shall take for pro- viding a house against my coming over, where I may remain with my family, till I can be better provided".
For a number of reasons, these grandiose schemes failed to materialize in full, but a stockade or "fort" was actually built, enclos- ing a rather pretentious "Great Hall".
Similar conditions existed in all the early New England settle- ments. They were financed by men of substance who relied on those
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of experience for the details of operation. At Springfield, in 1636, one of the three who financed the project was Jehu Burr, a carpenter of ample means. The earliest house there of which any detailed record remains was the one built in 1639 for George Moxon, the first minister. The specifications provided "for the frame of a house, thirty-five feet long and fifteen feet wide, with a porch, five feet out and seven feet wide, with a study over head, with stairs into the cellar and chamber, making doors and laying boards for four rooms, with double chimneys; for the thatching of the house; for the sawing of all the boards and slit work; four locks, with nails and hooks and hinges for the doors; for the daubing of the house and chimneys, undepinning the frame; making the stack and over seven feet high; with laths and nails."
Newport, Rhode Island, was established in 1639 and that first year it was "ordered that Ralph Earle and Mr. Wilbore his copartner shall serve the town with good sufficient stuff, vizt; with sawn board at eight shillings the hundred and one half inch board at seven shill- ings; to be delivered at the pit by the waterside and clapboards and pale at twelve pence a foot."
Substantial houses of that decade survive in sufficient numbers to provide full knowledge of their construction.
For some fifty years, this writer has in vain sought for one single early seventeenth century mention of a log house in southern New England. Though the search will be continued with all eager- ness, he is confident that such will never be found.
In support of the early log house theory, it has been argued that cutting timber for such served the double purpose of clearing the land for planting and providing a supply of building material as well.
This presupposes a condition which did not exist. These English- men were without experience in forest clearing and had no need to acquire it. The lands bought from the Indians by the early settlers were the cleared fields of the natives and the rich alluvial meadows which could be had in quantities far in excess of their needs. Hitch- cock's Geology of Massachusetts (1835) says: "In some instances the deposition of alluvium on the Connecticut, the Deerfield and the West- field is fifteen to twenty feet thick. Logs, leaves, walnuts, butternuts are frequently imbedded to that depth and but slightly changed. Every river in the state and every brook present tracts of this stratum. The consequence is a great fertility of soil."
It was the pioneer of a later century who hewed his habitation from the forest.
After the termination of Queen Anne's War in 1713 there was a little cautious venturing into the hill country, but not for more than another quarter century was there much occupancy of the Berkshires or the Taconics. Then was the high tide of the log house era in Massachusetts and Connecticut, for the forests by then had been long unmolested and provided ample material. Craftsmen were then not as adept with the whip-saw as were their fathers. In the hill
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towns, saw-mills were not early available. A knowledge of log house construction had been acquired from adjoining settlements and the adoption of such a structure was most logical.
Mission House, Stockbridge
First Indian Mission in the County, now restored and furnished with early American furniture.
Ample evidence exists to show that in the eighteenth century, log houses were fairly common. Mr. J. Frederick Kelly cites the three following examples in Connecticut:
Until quite recently there stood in North Fairfield a log house which the Fairfield land records indicate was built between 1685 and 1700.
The earliest records of Judea Society (now the town of Washington) are missing, but the Rev. H. B. Turner examined them before they were lost and says they contained a vote passed in 1742 to build a log house twenty-five feet long and twenty feet wide, to be used as a meeting house.
On December 20, 1743, the town of Salisbury voted "that we shall build a log house on the ministers seventy five acre pitch".
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"4). The settlement of Adams and Cheshire, Massachusetts, com- menced in 1768, and rather convincing tradition quoted by William B. Browne of Adams, indicates that the first houses there were of logs.
To a great degree, the persistence of the erroneous belief that the earliest homes of the New England settlers were log houses, is due to a lack of realization of forest conditions at the time the early settlements were being established. These conditions are herein dis- cussed, under the title "Primitive Forests".
At the moment it is sufficient to say that while popular fancy pictures the region as one of unbroken forests, yet in southern New England there is today more wooded area than when the Pilgrims landed. At least south of the Merrimac and east of the Connecticut and on the entire Connecticut coast, the semi-annual burnings of the Indians destroyed practically all timber except that growing in swamps and other low, wet lands. This scarcity of timber alone would have been such a deterrent in any plan for building this type of house as to make it prohibitive.
The destruction of the Pequots in 1637 put an end to this custom in parts of Connecticut and in other settled communities, and gradual improvements came about. In 1640 Governor Coddington, at Rhode Island, made a treaty with the sachem Miantonomo, in which it was agreed that "no Indian whatever shall, winter or summer, kindle or cause to be kindled, any fire upon our lands, but such as they shall put forth immediately upon their departure". Thus protected, that which was but a maple seed or an acorn at the time of the Pequot war, became a tree more than a century old, at the time these northern Connecticut buildings were erected and of sufficient size for such a purpose.
Numerous early writers confirm these statements, and contem- porary records attest their accuracy. Springfield was established May 14, 1636. The earliest town order, or record, is that of October 17, 1636, which provided "that from this day forward, no trees shall be cut down or taken away by any man, in the compass of ground from the Mill river upward to John Reader's lot". These limits included the entire town plot and all of the town in which any individual had proprietary rights.
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